Why continue to stir up things and aggravate others?

This seems to be further discussion of something several of us seem to still want to discuss in a non-personal and positive way.

Peace does not exist of its own accord, but through a conscious effort to develop and maintain understanding and tolerance.

Seems to me the Mudcat could use some more understanding and tolerance. Also, seems to me, we can arrive at that by respectful and healthy debate, as well as sharing the music, which is included in darn near every thread I've ever seen in here, including the BS ones. It seems a "natural progression" in most non-specific threads.

Katlaughing

I'm going to add my remarks to Kat's message, because I don't want to bring this to the top of the Forum Menu again.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: All this nonsense
From: Joe Offer
Date: 25-Jul-99 - late afternoon

Gee, this all reminds me of my years as a Scout leader and camp counselor. It took me a few years to learn it, but I finally figured out that when there was a fight going on, it was not my job to determine who was right or wrong - what I was supposed to do is stop the fight. So, that's the deal - I don't care who's to blame. I just want it to stop, because everybody's getting hurt.

There were certain threads that were continuing the cycle of bitterness, and Max decided to interrupt that cycle. What he said was that any messages that were added after his post would be deleted. If somebody still wants to talk about it, I suppose they can post to this or a new thread, and they can even post links to those other threads if they really want to. Since there is that freedom, I don't think anybody has cause to squawk about "censorship."

I think that there are some people here I can call "victims," people who have made targets of themselves, one way or another. Certain people seem to draw attacks to themselves, and most people do not. there are various reasons for that, and I do not care to dwell on it; but I think that everyone should think about whether they say things in a way that leaves them unprotected. Then there are the "aggressors," who swoop down and pummel the victims with remarks they view as clever. Then the victims are mortally offended and limp away whimpering. Then comes the really melodramatic part - the rest of us, the "good guys," ride in on our white horses to give comfort and support the victims with a hundred smarmy messages so they can get right back up on their feet and be victims again.

And so the cycle repeats itself, and the battle thread soon becomes 150 messages long.

I think I'm pretty good at stepping back and looking at all this objectively. Maybe not, but I think I am. Well, from my perspective, it all looks like a really bad soap opera. Usually, the bulk of the discussion at the 'Cat is quite interesting, and a casual visitor can find all sorts of wonderful stuff to explore. Over the last week, the forum was full of vicious infighting, and it isn't anything to be proud of. I don't think anybody who came for a visit last week will bother coming back.

The balance seems to be back now - mostly music, and a fair amount of other discussion. Some of the discussion may be quite heated, and that's as it should be - but let's see if we can do it right this time.

-Joe Offer-